


Thick Skin And An Elastic Heart

by EmiAliceinWonderland



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Abusive Parents, Angst, Canonical Child Abuse, Dissociation, Friendship, Friendship/Love, Gen, Homophobic Language, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-07
Updated: 2016-11-07
Packaged: 2018-08-29 18:28:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8500525
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmiAliceinWonderland/pseuds/EmiAliceinWonderland
Summary: An exploration of Adam's abuse.





	

**Author's Note:**

> ~ Trigger warnings apply for abuse and strong language etc. as this is a fic heavily featuring Adam's father. Please don't read if it will upset you!~
> 
> I have a deep need to write angst at least once a month and I can't stop it (I'm sorry, Maikay). I was listening to Elastic Heart by Sia (feel free to listen and cry as you read), and it sounded like an Adam Parrish anthem to me, and so this fic was written with inspiration from the lyrics.  
> Sorry it's a bit dark, but I wanted to explore more of Adam's backstory, because there's so much he hides :(

_(Another one bites the dust, Oh why can I not conquer love?)_

Adam flinches. His father's beer bottle smashing on the ground below seems to fall in slow motion, tiny shards of glass catch the light and scatter onto the floor of the trailer. A large piece, jagged around the edges, narrowly misses slashing Adam's ankle. He steps back. His dad smirks. 

"Scared?" he goads, his breath all alcohol and cigarette smoke and bitterness. 

"No, I just --"

"Don't talk back, boy!" Robert Parrish snaps, and Adam sucks in a deep breath, letting his gaze fall to the floor. 

"Sorry, dad." 

He feels his dad's chubby fingers, clumsy with beer and shaking with rage lift his chin, and then he goes. His mind floats away, and he is not in his body in a trailer park in Virginia anymore. 

He wonders, as his dad is slapping him across the face again and again and again and again and -- he wonders why he can't get things right, why he can't be the son his father wants, why he can't be someone his father can love. 

At some point he falls to the floor, but he's still thinking vaguely about love and what he's doing wrong, and how he could try harder and how if only, somehow he could make his parents love him then maybe he wouldn't have to deal with this. 

His ears are ringing and his cheek stings, but his eyes are glazed, blurry. His surroundings don't mean much when he's dissacociating. He closes his eyes as another blow comes. 

 _Don't get him the wrong beer next time_ , he repeats to himself to ingrain it in his mind as he drifts away. He won't make the same mistake twice. 

\---

_(I might have thought that we were one, wanted to fight this war without weapons.)_

Gansey tries his best to help Adam with his family. Numerous times he's asked if Adam can "talk about things" with his dad, and Adam has always scoffed at the idea. His dad doesn't do talking. He does shouting, swearing, yelling. But not conversations. Anything he wants to say he can say with a fist to Adam's face. They both understand each other at this point. 

But Adam Parrish is not one to stop trying, and so on his father's birthday, for the first time in five years, he decides he is going to try to hold out an olive branch, wave his white flag, and maybe, maybe, maybe, his dad will accept it. Adam hasn't made any big mistakes in a while, he's been busy with school, working, or out with Gansey and Ronan and Noah working on finding Glendower at the weekends. He's hardly seen his father, surely he can't have annoyed him too much in the past few weeks. 

"Dad?" Adam tentatively calls out, a card and a small wrapped present behind his back as he makes his way into the family trailer after a long day at the garage. 

"Shh, he's sleeping, Adam!" his mother hisses at him. 

Robert Parrish is predictably on his chair, beer bottle clutched in his hand that is dangling off the armrest. 

"Can I--" Adam starts, clearing his throat with a nervous cough. 

His father startles awake. 

"Goddammit, boy, do you have to come in so loudly?!", he grunts, sitting up in his chair, already looking like he's in a bad mood and needs a target to take it out on. 

Adam's mother shakes her head, looking disappointed in her son. 

"You come back far too late," she says, "what are you doing all day, anyway? Nothing useful, I bet."

Adam doesn't have the energy to answer back. 

He keeps the watch he had picked out for his dad for himself instead. It cost too much money to throw away.

\---

_(I wanted it, I wanted it bad, but there were so many red flags.)_

Adam's main goal in life was to get out of Henrietta, to get away from the place he grew up, away from all the bad memories and the suffocation that lingered there. But he wanted to do this without any help, without anyone realising what he was going through, without anyone at all noticing the bruises and the tears and the scars. 

God, the stupid, stupid scars. 

He'd never really had friends before Gansey and Ronan and Noah. Being friendless worked in your favour when you wanted to hide things. 

Of course, Gansey was the one to figure it out. Adam overheard him discussing it with Ronan and had never been able to hide since, constantly having to turn down Gansey's offerings of money or a place to stay, and trying his best to brush off Ronan's concerned glances. 

_"There's too many red flags: bruises every other week, not wanting to talk about his family life, not letting us go round to his place or drop him off closer to his home?"_

_"I -- yeah, I agree. But Gansey, he doesn't want us to know. I can tell he doesn't."_

_"But it's getting bad, Ronan. I can't stand by and watch him suffer. I just can't."_

_\---_

_(Lets be clear I trust no one. I may snap and I move fast. I walked through fire to save my life.)_

Adam's first fight with his friends breaks his heart. 

He is used to fighting with his family, but never his friends. Never his friends because he hasn't had any before. 

It's a stupid fight. 

They're all at the 24/7 convienience store after school. Ronan is skulking through the aisles and throwing in expensive shampoo and deodrant without a care in the world. Gansey is considering his items more carefully, but still filling his basket up with far too many highly priced things for Adam's comfort. 

Adam has two products in his basket: the cheapest toothpaste he could find, and a treat for himself - a new bar of soap. His old one is so tiny and soggy and dirty now that he hardly thinks it's doing anything to wash the grease off his hands from work. He wishes he could afford the handcream that had been on the shelf next to the soap, but he just can't justify giving away his money for something that's not absoloutely essential, no matter how dry and cracked his palms are.

At the checkout counter Gansey puts his basket on the till, and then holds out a hand for Adam's items. 

Adam raises an eyebrow at him in question. 

"I'm paying," he says casually, fishing his wallet out of the pocket of his chinos. "Isn't there anything else you want?", he adds with a frown as he sees the meagre contents of Adam's basket. 

"You're not paying for me," Adam immediately snaps back. He has already counted out the $3.20 in coins that he needs to pay, he has already written down his allowance for this week, he has this figured out, he doesn't need help. He doesn't want help. The fact that Gansey thinks - _knows -_ that he can't afford even the cheapeast of shopping trips makes acid rise in his throat. He feels like the whole store is watching and laughing and whispering about the little trailer boy who doesn't fit in with his Aglionby friends. He feels like Gansey and Ronan must have regular talks about how poor and pathetic he is, about how they need to save him, help him. He doesn't trust anybody to help him. His thoughts are spiraling, and he feels his face turn cold like a mask, no one getting in to see his emotions, he knows he's overreacting but he can't help it. He'd rather push people away than let them in to see the real him - the stupid, pathetic, dirt poor boy he really is. 

Gansey looks a little taken aback, but flashes a charming smile at the cashier as she begins scanning his items. 

"No, Adam, really, it's fine," he whispers to his friend, careful not to cause a scene. 

Somehow that makes Adam even more angry. 

"I can afford some fucking toothpaste," he spits out. His response is far too harsh and loud and rude and angry to be justified, but he is a Parrish and he cannot change his DNA, and the knowledge of that only serves to disgust him and make him even more angry. 

"Jeez, calm down, Parrish," he hears Ronan say from the other side of him, probably a joke to ease the tension, but it makes him want to scream. 

"Forget it," he says, dropping his basket. It clatters to the floor, people turn to stare, Ronan swears under his breath, suddenly aware he read the atmosphere wrong, and Adam walks out of the store, tears prickling his eyes and his pride on the floor in pieces. 

 

_\---_

_(I've got thick skin and an elastic heart, but your blade it might be too sharp.)_

When all is said and done, the court case over, Adam out of his family home, he thinks he will finally be able to find some peace. 

For the first time in his life he has friends that forgive him when he's irrational, people that understand him and accept him, and a safe place to go home to at night with a lock on the door that his father doesn't have the key too. 

Ronan is over for the night. He prefers St. Agnes to Monmouth these days, because it's above the church and calms him, or because Adam lives there, it isn't clear. Adam doesn't mind either way. He pretends to be annoyed when Ronan hums too loudly to the music in his headphones whilst Adam's trying to work, but he's never ungrateful for the other boy's presence. 

Adam doesn't remember closing his eyes, or putting his head down on his desk, or falling asleep at all. But his dad is here, somehow in the apartment. Adam didn't let him in, but he got in somehow. He's angry, fuming, livid, blood boiling red hot at the fact that Adam took him to court, and Ronan Lynch testified against him. His dad immediately sees Ronan asleep on Adam's bed. It's 2.30AM, Adam must have drifted off over his homework. 

"So you're sleeping with that little fag, huh?", Robert Parrish snarls at him, "Is that how you got him to testify against me? By fucking him?"

Adam feels sick, acid is rising in his throat and he's frozen. He's forgotten how to zone out, how to turn off his emotions and stand still whilst his father shouts and swings at him. 

"Please, please, don't hurt him," he gets out, standing up, legs shaking. 

"Oh, I'll hurt you first, don't worry," his dad laughs, his face twisting into something demonic, his hand turning into hard, cold metal that could break Adam so easily. The impact is about to come, his father is about to knock him down, knock the life right out of him, and he is terrified and --

He screams. 

\---

_(You did not break me, I'm still fighting for peace.)_

Ronan startles awake, heart beating so fast and hard he thinks it might burst out of his chest.

"Parrish, oh my god, what's wrong?" he gasps out as soon as can, scrambling off the mattress on floor of Adam's tiny apartment, looking around frantically for danger. 

All he sees is Adam at his desk, white and sweating and shaking and crying softly, a hand clapped over his mouth. 

There is no danger in the room, no night terrors, or people there to harm them. Ronan, with a painful clench in his chest, recognises immediately what has happened. 

"Adam..." he says softly, getting up slowly so as not to startle the other boy, before making his way over to the desk where he's still sitting. 

Adam is staring at nothing, but his breathing is far too fast. 

"Hey," Ronan says gently, in a voice that he wouldn't be heard dead using around anyone but those closest to his heart. 

"You're safe, you're okay," he says in the same tone, kneeling on the floor in front of Adam, who has drawn his hands up to his mouth as he hyperventilates, tears pouring silent but ridiculously fast down his cheeks and onto his lap now. A few wet drops have splattered onto his homework sheets, and Ronan carefully moves them out of the way off his knees and into a neat pile on his desk. 

Ronan hesitates for a second, wondering what would make him feel better in a moment like this, wondering what he can do to best comfort his friend. 

 _Asking is always best_ , his mother had told him. _Ask people what they need from you._

"Would you like a hug?", he whispers into the dim room, illuminated only by the desk light that Parrish had left on before falling asleep. 

Adam sucks in a deep, harsh breath, his eyes wide and red. A beat passes, Ronan's heart skips. 

Adam nods. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Comments very appreciated!


End file.
